Time to Start Wasting Time
The worship and social life at my congregation is encountering enormous stress these days, and it's not our fault. Everybody is just too busy, carrying an unhealthy amount of stress and just being crazy busy.
It seems as if every family with children in school is busy all the time. It's nonstop. They're too busy with soccer, football, dance, piano, cheerleading, equestrian, sailing, camps, math club, theater or summer school.
Sunday after Sunday, entire families are absent from church. Good, faithful, active families. Then one of the parents will tell me they were away because of some soccer match on Sunday morning 100 miles away.
And it's not just the kids. Attendance is down for committee meetings and church-wide events. Everybody's busy all the time.
Problem is, people reach a point where they are so busy that even going to church or attending a congregational social event -- which out to be refreshing -- seems like just another thing on the "to do" list.
Veteran pastors have told me to calm down, because every congregation has its rhythms and low points, and they are to be expected.
But even so, I think there is a fundamental problem with how our culture treats stewardship of time. It's as if every second has to be invested in doing something, lest it be a "waste of time."
In fact, it is a bigger waste of our lives and energy to fail to allow time for reflection, renewal and recreation. That's recreation, as in re-creation, to make new again.
All of this seems lost on a culture that reveres the 10 commandments, whose sons and daughters fight for the right to have the 10 commandments displayed in public, but whose people have forgotten the simple wisdom that has guided faithful people for thousands of years:
Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your manservant or maidservant, nor your animals, nor the alien within your gates. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy (Exodus 20:9-11).
--Rob Blezard, editor and webmaster
Reprint rights eagerly granted for nonprofit congreagational use. Just include this notice: "Copyright (c) 2007 The Rev. Robert Blezard, www.stewardshipoflife.org. Used by permission."
New this Week:
Developing a Ministry Based Church Budget
How does your congregation go about setting a church budget? Most simply take last year’s budget and add a little here and there. A ministry-based budget asks congregations to go back to their core mission, their ministry dreams and visions. This resource will help tell you how. Very practical! Click here for “Developing a Ministry Based Church Budget,” from the Louisiana Baptist Convention.
Taking Time for Others is Talent Enough
" Our days are so full, and people seem to be going faster and faster all the time. We begin to think that we are not accomplishing anything unless we are multitasking and doing three things at once. That makes it even harder to have the time to be patient with people." Click here for "Gratitude Never Goes on Vacation ," the latest essay by SOLI columnist Dana Reardon. Click here to read archived columns.
Environmental Stewardship a Growing Presence in Churches
“We share a conviction that it is our responsibility to care for the Earth,” said Bill Breakey, chair of the church environmental stewardship committee at Maryland Presbyterian Church in Towson, MD. “It’s a God-given treasure, and we are a part of it.” Hear what other churches are doing to key into the environment. Click here for “Environmental Stewardship,” in Chesapeake Bay Journal.
June 18 - 24, 2006